LONDON — French President Emmanuel Macron undermined NATO unity by displaying a “go-it-alone” attitude that angered diplomats around the world, America’s envoy to NATO said.
“We think France’s statements are way out of line,” Kay Bailey Hutchison, the U.S. ambassador to the international alliance, told the Washington Examiner. “And there was quite a lot of consternation among our allies about France’s sort of go-it-alone mentality.”
Macron emerged as a source of consternation in London, where alliance leaders huddled for a NATO meeting to celebrate the security bloc’s 70th anniversary. The assembly took place amid significant disputes between key allies, but Macron’s public suggestion that NATO is suffering a “brain death” due to President Trump’s lack of affection for the alliance had other officials privately dubbing Macron “the new disrupter” of the group.
“His disruption has led to a strengthening of NATO,” Hutchison said of Trump, “Whereas President Macron is talking about going it alone, and Europe can defend itself, and no one believes that that is a security umbrella that anyone would count on.”
Macron rattled European allies by airing his frustration with Trump’s posture towards NATO, as he suggested that the European Union should take care of itself.
“I’d argue that we should reassess the reality of what NATO is in the light of the commitment of the United States,” he said last month. “Secondly, in my opinion, Europe has the capacity to defend itself.”
Hutchison dismissed those comments. “The United States needs to lead NATO, we are leading NATO, we’re making it stronger, and we’re going to stay together,” she said.
Other NATO allies and analysts, remembering Trump’s clashes with leaders at the 2018 summit in Brussels, welcomed the idea that his bellicose energies were directed in support of NATO.
“There does seem to be a strange dynamic at play, and we’re still trying to figure out what to make of it,” Christopher Skaluba, director of the Atlantic Council’s transatlantic security initiative, told the Washington Examiner.
Hutchison leaned into Trump’s formal embrace of NATO, applauding European leaders for increasing their spending at the president’s behest.
“President Trump was very direct about what NATO was and believing that the Europeans did not stand up for their part to do enough,” Hutchison said. “And the Europeans have come through.”
